How long had I been here?
A day? Two?
Hours earlier I had devoured the single ration of bread and milk. Now there are stabbing hunger pains in my side. I do not know when the next rations are coming, if they are coming at all.
But I am not permitted to feel hunger.
It is against the rules.
10
King Shaka International Airport, Durban, South Africa, 2011
Today’s word: Carnage.
Across the table, Milo Stanton prodded enthusiastically at his iPhone. He insisted he wasn’t addicted.
Lately he’d become engrossed with a new app. It displayed a different word every day, sometimes exotic, sometimes mundane, but the aim apparently was to try and fit it into everyday conversation. Something to do with extending the vocab. Milo Stanton needed this app, more than he knew.
Despite the coffee shop’s tepid effort at a latte, Abigail Fuller, or Abigail Chambers as she was known now, decided she was in a good mood. It was one of the better business trips she’d been on and although Milo’s company wasn't exactly ideal, he could usually make her laugh.
Carnage was an apt word; the airport was chaos.
‘You should get one of these things,’ Milo recommended. ‘It’s like having a third arm.’
‘I’ve managed fine with just the two my entire life.’
‘What are you scared of? Afraid it’s going to jump up and bite you on the arse?’
‘Technology’s going too fast,’ she explained. ‘It’s all going to come crashing down at some point, believe me.’
‘Agh, I never thought I’d be given the glorious opportunity to meet such a developed technophobe! What is it that frightens you so much?’
‘Fright has nothing to do with it. Trust is a better word.’
Milo flashed his broad and patronising smile. ‘I think somebody’s watched the Terminator films too many times!’
‘People rely too heavily on technology. Nobody knows how to think for themselves anymore, that’s all I’m saying. You, me, we're the last generation of children to have actual personalities.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Take that family there.’ Abbey pointed out the perfect nuclear arrangement. ‘Teenage son glued to his phone, slightly older teenage daughter focused on a DS. Nobody on that table is talking. Not to one another at least. Technology is killing the art of conversation.’
‘Ah, but that’s one family. With most people I don’t think your logic qualifies.’
‘Based on?’
‘Absolutely nothing!’
‘Not the best of arguments,’ she laughed
‘Abbey, you don’t…’
Milo’s sentence trailed off as a large man in an NYC baseball cap stopped next to their booth and stared at them fixatedly. In one hand he held a copy of a sport’s car magazine, the other a half-eaten doughnut.
‘Help you?’ Milo asked.
The man held his stare. He looked confused.
Instead of shying away, Abbey held the man’s gaze, green eyes locked onto brown. Something about that seemed to unhinge him. He glanced down at his feet as though embarrassed and walked quickly away, pushing past an elderly man impeding his escape.
‘Freak!’ Milo shouted after him.
‘Shut up, Milton!’ she warned. ‘We don’t want any trouble, especially not from a giant.’
‘Don’t call me that!’ Milton snapped.
Abbey grinned.
‘Did you see the way that guy was looking at you?’ Milo whispered slyly. ‘He looked like you with an iPad.’
‘Confused?’
‘Angry!’
Whatever that meant.
This was the fourth trip she’d done with Milo. Dennis Smith had been his predecessor but had since retired. The old goat was living out in Canada somewhere now, he and his wife. Dennis had been certain democracy in the UK was on the plunge. The slow downfall nobody was really seeing, or were choosing not to. He talked for a long time about his longing to be back in a community where money was not the governor of society and people were still happy.
She missed him.
If life was a comic book, Milo would’ve made the perfect archenemy for Dennis. He was quite literally the man’s opposite. His love for money was not lost on anybody, nor was his devotion to possessions, and he seemed to be quite proud of the fact that he didn’t know a soul on his street.
Still, Milo’s two-dimensional attitude aside, she couldn’t deny that she liked the kid. At twenty-three he was an up-and-comer in the architectural field. Having been rejected to design the drainage systems for the new Wellington Court financial blocks in north London, he went away and drew up the blueprints off his own back. He submitted them anonymously, and the company ended up going with his designs instead of their own. Though no more efficient, he’d managed to reduce the amount of required project materials by sixteen percent. When word got out that it was Milo who’d come up with the design, those up above began looking at him as the next household name.
‘I can’t do any more of this coffee,’ Abbey grumbled. ‘I’m going to have a walk around, see if I can find something to read on the flight.’
‘Hey, don’t forget we need to’ve gone over these proposals by the time we land in North Shore. I want the commission on this one, Abs.’
‘Keep your hair on, Whiz!’ We’re set to hit it for six.’
‘I’m just saying, one more green light in New Zealand and we’ll be flying home with a hat-trick. And you know what that means - new BMW for me.’
She pushed herself out of the booth and climbed to her feet. ‘There’re more things to life than cars and money, Milo.’
‘Only poor people say that!'
Joining the multicultural ebb of people moving through the airport, she recalled a bookstore she’d seen at the top end of the terminal. Wrestling through the human traffic, she stepped into the congested store, noticing the shop assistant’s eyes lingering on her. Did she have something written on her face today, she wondered?
Idly
